Appellate Division upholds stay on 4 more Khaleda cases
The Appellate Division on Sunday upheld a High Court ruling of 2017 that stayed proceedings of four more cases filed against former prime minister and Bangladesh Nationalist Party chairperson Khaleda Zia accusing her of instigating violence.
An online Appellate Division bench led by Chief Justice Syed Mahmud Hossain passed the order and directed the HC to dispose of the rule.
Two of the cases were filed with Jatrabari Police Station in the capital on January 24 under Special Powers Act on January 24, 2015, and two others with Darus Salam Police Station on January 29, 2015 and on March 3, 2015 for allegedly sabotaging public property.
The HC, responding to Khaleda’s petition challenging the lower courts taking cognisance of the cases, in separate rulings issued between May 6 and May 17, 2017, asked the government to explain why the orders of Dhaka Metropolitan Special Tribunal 1, which took cognisance of charges in four cases against Khaleda under Special Powers Act allegedly for sabotaging public properties would not be scrapped.
The court also gave Khaleda bail until disposing of the rulings.
Khaleda’s lawyer Mahbub Uddin Khokan, after the AD order, told reporters that Khaleda was not referred in first information reports of the cases lodged with Darus Salam and Jatrabari police stations in 2015.
He also said that the BNP chairperson was rather confined in her Gulshan office by the law enforcement agencies during the incidents.
Her name was included in the charge-sheets submitted to the lower court in 2016 which was politically motivated.
Besides, he said, during confinement at her office the electricity, telephone and internet connections to the office was cut off and one cannot order anything at this situation and, as a result, the proceedings should not continue.
As a result, Mahbub Uddin said, his client had appealed to the HC for cancellation of the proceedings.
Mahbub said that the government then appealed the Appellate Division challenging the HC Division rule and the AD disposed of the government appeal upholding the HC order and directing to dispose of the HC rule.
On August 17, 2020, the Appellate Division upheld HC ruling staying proceedings of four other cases lodged with the two police stations — Jatrabari and Darus Salam — in lower court and directed to dispose of the HC ruling in connection with the cases.
On the same day, Dhaka metropolitan sessions judge KM Imrul Kayes set October 6 for hearing on 11 cases against the BNP chairperson, including the eight that were stayed by the AD on August 17, 2020 and on Sunday.
Source: New Age
